Late Night Retro Television Review: Monsters 3.14 “Household Gods”

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire series is streaming on YouTube.

This week, we meet a chauvinistic demon.

Episode 3.14 “Household Gods”

(Dir by Michael Warren Powell, originally aired on December 30th, 1990)

Deborah (Deborah Van Valkenburgh) is a married woman who is trying to balance her career with taking care of her baby. No matter how hard Deborah tries to keep it together, it seems like there’s just one household crisis after another and her husband (Jeffrey Ware) doesn’t appear to have any sympathy for her predicament. Deborah hires a nanny (Priscilla Shanks) who tells Deborah that her attitude has upset the Household God, a little misogynistic monster who punishes women who want a life outside of the home. Deborah is skeptical but, this being an episode of Monsters, it turns out the nanny was right. There is a messy and self-centered deity living in her house and he’s going out of his way to make her life difficult. He’s played, under a good deal of makeup, by Michael Anderson, the actor who played “The Man From Another World” on Twin Peaks.

This episode had potential. The idea that there’s a little sexist demon that is responsible for making it so difficult to balance family and career was an intriguing one and also one that was ripe for satire. Tonally, though, this episode never quite came together. This was one of those episodes that couldn’t seem to decide if it wanted to be a comedy or a horrific drama and as a result, it just kind of fell flat. Deborah Van Valkenburgh gave about as good a performance as one could, considering that the show itself often didn’t seem to know how it felt about her character and her predicament. But, for the most part, this episode was a good idea that was poorly executed.

It happens.

Dennis Quaid in Toad Suck, Arkansas!

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Bradley Crain

Happy 71st Birthday to Dennis Quaid. He’s been in a lot of good movies over the years, but I’m quite partial to a movie he made in 1977 called SEPTEMBER 30, 1955. He stars alongside Richard Thomas, Tom Hulce, Susan Tyrrell, Deborah Benson and Lisa Blount. The movie is about a group of friends at the Arkansas State Teachers College, which is my Alma mater the University of Central Arkansas, who deal with the death of James Dean. It’s a good movie that was filmed all around central Arkansas, including my home community of Toad Suck, Arkansas. In the picture above he’s sitting on a “beach” along the Arkansas River in Toad Suck. I’ve been there many times. The movie was written and directed by the talented Arkansan James Bridges, of THE PAPER CHASE and URBAN COWBOY fame. It’s a film well worth searching out. I’ve included the trailer below.

Uncommon Valor (1983, directed by Ted Kotcheff)

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Jedadiah Leland

Retired Marine Colonel Jason Rhodes (Gene Hackman) and oilman Harry MacGregor (Robert Stack) share a tragic bonf. Both of them have sons that served in Vietnam and are listed as being MIA. Believing that their sons are still being secretly held in a POW camp in Loas, Rhodes and MacGregor put together a team to sneak into Southeast Asia and rescue them.

With MacGregor supplying the money and Rhodes leading the mission, the team includes Blaster (Red Brown), Wilkes (Fred Ward), Sailor (Randall “Tex” Cobb), and Charts (Tim Thomerson), all of whom served with Rhodes’s son. Also joining in his helicopter pilot Curtis Johnson (Harold Sylvester) and former Marine Kevin Scott (Patrick Swayze), whose father was also listed as being MIA in Vietnam. After a rough start, the group comes together and head into Laos to bring the prisoners home!

Uncommon Valor is one of the many movies released in the 80s in which Vietnam vets returned to Asia and rescued those who were left behind. In the 80s, there was a very strong belief amongst many Americans that soldiers were still being held prisoner in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos and Hollywood was quick to take advantage of it. The box office success of Uncommon Valor set the stage for films like Rambo and Missing In Action, film in which America got the victory that it had been denied in real life.

What set Uncommon Valor apart from the films that followed was the cast. Not surprisingly, Gene Hackman brings a lot more feeling and nuance to his performance as the obsesses Col. Rhodes than Sylvester Stallone and Chuck Norris brought to their trips to Vietnam. The film surrounds Hackman with a quirky supporting cast, all of whom represent different feelings about and reactions to the war in Vietnam. Fred Ward’s character suffers from PTSD. Randall “Tex” Cobb, not surprisingly, is a wild man. Patrick Swayze’s character is trying to make the father he’ll never know proud. Robert Stack and Gene Hackman represent the older generation, still trying to come to terms with everything that was lost in Vietnam and still mourning their sons. The raid on the POW camp is exciting but it doesn’t feature the type of superhuman action that’s present in other POW-rescue films. Col. Rhodes and his soldiers are ordinary men. Not all of them survive and not all of them get what they want.

Uncommon Valor started out as a screenplay from Wings Hauser, though he’s not present in the cast of the final film and he was only given a “story” credit. John Milius served as producer. Director Ted Kotcheff is best-known for First Blood, another action film about America’s struggle to come to terms with the Vietnam War.

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 5.24 “Isaac Gets Physical/She Brought Her Mom Along/Cold Feet”

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986! The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

This week, horror royalty boards the Love Boat!

Episode 5.24 “Isaac Gets Physical/She Brought Her Mother Along/Cold Feet”

(Dir by Bob Sweeney, originally aired on March 20th, 1982)

For this week, and this week only, there’s a new member of the Love Boat crew. Charlene Glover (Shirley Hemphill) is a nurse who has been sent to give every member of the crew a physical in order to make sure that it’s safe for them to work on a cruise ship. Isaac panics because he has high blood pressure and he worries that he’s going to lose his job as a result. This would seem like a good opportunity for the show to share some tips on what to do if you suffer from high blood pressure but instead, the whole storyline is a smitten Charlene chasing Isaac and Isaac trying to change his medical records. It was a bit mean-spirited since most of the laughs came from the idea of Isaac having to get romantic with someone who was overweight in order to keep his job.

(That said, take your blood pressure seriously, everyone. My Dad had high blood pressure his entire life and it was not easy for him.)

Speaking of mean-spirited, Carter Randall (Richard Dean Anderson) is engaged to marry Muffy (Linda Blair …. yes, that Linda Blair) but he’s getting cold feet. So, he starts leaving her messages and making phone calls to her in which he speaks with a fake Southern accent. There are three Texans on the boat and Carter is pretending to be one of them, hoping that Muffy will fall in love with this imaginary person and then break off their marriage …. WHAT A JERK! And yet, somehow, this plan causes Carter to realize how much he does love Muffy and Muffy is totally forgiving when the truth comes out. Seriously, that’s not the Linda Blair that we all know from such classic films as Savage Streets and Chained Heat! What the heck, Linda?

(I should also mention that Carter’s attempt at a Texas accent was terrible. In fact, none of the actors playing the Texans had a convincing accent. For shame, Love Boat, for shame!)

Finally, Millicent (Betsy Palmer) boards the boat with her daughter, Debbie (Connie Needham). Debbie introduces Millicent to her boyfriend and it turns out that Debbie’s dating some guy who is at least twenty years old than her. In fact, Ted (Gene Barry) is so old that he used to date Millicent! Wow, creepy! Anyway, Millicent and Ted realize that they’re still in love so sorry, Debbie. Ted even says he fell in love with Debbie because she reminded him of Millicent. Somehow, Debbie learns all of this without jumping overboard.

As a horror fan, I enjoyed this episode. Gene Barry was in War of the Worlds. Linda Blair was in The Exorcist. Betsy Palmer was the original Mrs. Voorhies. They really should have aired this episode in October. The stories were terrible but I simply can’t resist an episode that featured this much horror royalty.

The Eric Roberts Collection: Raptor (dir by Jim Wynorski)

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 2001’s Raptor, Eric Roberts stars as Jim Tanner, the sheriff of a small desert town. When the locals start turning up all shredded to heck, Sheriff Tanner suspects that maybe it was an animal attack. When the sheriff’s daughter (Lorissa McComas) witnesses one of the attacks and goes into a coma as a result, Tanner is determined to get justice, even if it means working with his ex-girlfriend, Barbara (Melissa Brasselle).

It turns out that it’s neither coyotes nor bears that are attacking the folks in the desert. Instead, it’s a bunch of dinosaurs that have been brought back into existence by Dr. Hyde (Corbin Bernsen, wearing a beret), a mad scientist who has a laboratory in a secret government installation. When the army realizes that there’s a bunch of mini-dinosaurs roaming the desert, they send in a special taskforce to take care of the problem.

It’s a pretty simple movie and no one in the cast, Roberts included, really seems to be taking it all that seriously. There a few scenes where Corbin Bernsen looks like he’s about to break out laughing at some of his dialogue. Director Jim Wynorski keeps the action moving and tosses in plenty of blood and a little nudity. If you’ve ever seen any of the other films that Wynorski directed for producer Roger Corman, you’ll know what to expect from Raptor.

The dinosaurs are cute. They’re all obviously puppets and there’s a lot of scenes of them moving quickly through the desert with an intense look in their eyes. Apparently, almost all of the dinosaur footage was lifted from the first three Carnosaur films, which perhaps explains why the film suddenly goes from being about Sheriff Tanner trying to protect his town from the dinosaurs to being about a bunch of soldiers hunting for the dinosaurs in Dr. Hyde’s underground lab. It’s cheap but it’s kind of fun, a timewaster that no one should take seriously.

Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed:

Song of the Day: Theme From Peter Gunn by Henry Mancini & His Orchestra

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s song of the day is one that will hopefully help me get a little bit more focused on getting things done. Either that, or it will inspire me to go out and drive really fast. I’ll find out soon enough!

4 Shots From 4 Films: Special French Cinema Edition

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

4 (or more) Shots From 4 (or more) Films is just what it says it is, 4 (or more) shots from 4 (or more) of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 (or more) Shots From 4 (or more) Films lets the visuals do the talking.

Today, on Jean-Paul Belmondo’s birthday, we pay tribute to French cinema! It’s time for….

4 Shots From 4 French Films

The Rules of the Games (1939, dir by Jean Renoir, DP: Jean-Paul Alphen, Jean Bachelet, Jacques Lemare, Alain Renoir)

Alphaville (1965, dir by Jean-Luc Godard, DP: Raoul Coutard)

Day For Night (1973, dir by François Truffaut, DP: Pierre-William Glenn)

Night of the Hunted (1980, dir by Jean Rollin)

Scenes That I Love: The Ending of Breathless

Posted on April 9, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today would have been the 92nd birthday of international screen icon, Jean-Paul Belmondo.

Belmondo spent the majority of his career in France, where he was one of the early faces of the New Wave and also a prominent action star, famed for doing his own very dangerous stunts. In America, he was best-known for his starring turn in Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless. In Breathless, Belmondo was the perfect existential outlaw, living life day-by-day and obviously doomed but still so incredibly magnetic and stylish.

In tribute to Belmondo, today’s scene that I love is the final moments of Breathless, with Belmondo and Jean Seberg.